"I think our life becomes more and more the opportunity to love the older we become. I think we have to stay close to the words of Jesus, 'When you were young you girded yourself and went where you wanted to go, but when you grow old someone else will gird you and lead you where you do not want to go.' It is this openness to new and unknown directions that makes growing old a real spiritual challenge.
I, indeed, feel that we are faced with a choice when we are in our fifties. It is a choice between considering our life as practically over or looking at our life as reaching a place of total commitment and total surrender. In a way, life and death are always placed before us, and God keeps saying, 'Choose life.' I am deeply convinced that the most important spiritual gifts can be offered precisely by those who choose life again when others think they have 'seen it all.'"